Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 40, No. 133.
Department of Digital Humanities, University of Cologne
Hosted by DH-Cologne
www.dhhumanist.org
Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
Date: 2026-08-26 08:58:35+00:00
From: Tim Smithers <tim.smithers@cantab.net>
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 40.110: repetition's point
Hello Ken, Jim, and Herbert,
Allow me, please, to wind the Humanist tape back a little? I
left some replies on the cutting room table and would like to
splice these into the Humanist recording.
Ken: the "quite apt" Kierkegaard quotation you posted may well
be apt, but, for me, it illustrates well what makes me think I
don't understand Kierkegaard's writings.
Jim: any understanding of Kierkegaard my words might suggest I
have is, I would say, accidental. But this is, it seems to
me, part of the fun and utility of languaging and the
conversations it affords; accidental understanding. (I often
think most of what I count as my understanding is accidental.)
Herbert: the philosopher who, way back now, told me about
Kierkegaard, studied Heraclitus' theory of flux. They told me
of the flowing river metaphor, and the idea we "cannot step
into the same river twice." They added to this the following
question: what if we step into a slow moving river with a leaf
in hand which we drop into the river as we step out of it,
then we walk down stream along the river bank at the same
speed we see our leaf being carried along by the river, and
then, at some suitable place further along the river, we step
back into it to pick up our leaf: do we step into the the same
river or not?
So, for all three of you, what counts as a repetition matters
in any repetition. Thus, a question about repetition becomes
a question about sameness, no? Did Kierkegaard have something
to say about samenesses? (I'm keen to mark out how text from
real writing is not the same as text from an automatic text
generator.)
-- Tim
PS: None of the text here was automatically generated.
> On 2 Aug 2026, at 09:51, Humanist <humanist@dhhumanist.org> wrote:
>
>
> Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 40, No. 110.
> Department of Digital Humanities, University of Cologne
> Hosted by DH-Cologne
> www.dhhumanist.org
> Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
>
>
> [1] From: Ken Friedman <ken.friedman.sheji@icloud.com>
> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 40.107: repetition's point (73)
>
> [2] From: James Rovira <jamesrovira@gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 40.107: repetition's point (10)
>
>
> --[1]------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Date: 2026-07-31 10:35:49+00:00
> From: Ken Friedman <ken.friedman.sheji@icloud.com>
> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 40.107: repetition's point
>
> Dear Tim,
>
> Kierkegaard wrote one thing about life and time that
> seems quite apt to what you write here:
>
> “It is quite true what philosophy says, that life must be
> understood backward. But then one forgets the other
> principle, that it must be lived forward. Which principle,
> the more one thinks it through, ends exactly
> with temporal life never being able to be properly
> understood . . .”
>
> Yours,
>
> Ken
>
>
>> On 31 Jul 2026, at 07:56, Humanist <humanist@dhhumanist.org> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 40, No. 107.
>> Department of Digital Humanities, University of Cologne
>> Hosted by DH-Cologne
>> www.dhhumanist.org
>> Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Date: 2026-07-30 10:16:40+00:00
>> From: Tim Smithers <tim.smithers@cantab.net>
>> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 40.88: repetition's point
>>
>> Dear Jim,
>>
>> I like your further elucidations on how special or unique the
>> first of something is.
>>
>> You bring out something I couldn't see how to say before.
>> There's the specialness or uniqueness of being the first time,
>> then there's the specialness or uniqueness of the first time
>> when there is also a second time, and perhaps more times. The
>> second time, and more times, cannot, I think, take away the
>> specialness of the first time, but it may add to the
>> specialness or uniqueness, and perhaps even swamp the first
>> time only specialness or uniqueness.
>>
>> Then, it seems to me, the specialness or uniqueness of the
>> first time, before any second or more times, may change how we
>> feel or re-experience or think about what we, at first, felt
>> about the second time, and subsequent further times. The
>> first, and so far only, time thus has, I'd say, a kind of
>> specialness which no subsequent time can have, no matter how
>> special or unique any subsequent time might turn out to be.
>>
>> And, from this, we see that experience is non-linear and not
>> one directional in what we call time. Which I like, because
>> it means, I'd claim, that the only place experience understood
>> this way can happen is in the real world, and that the only
>> way to have experiences in this way, is by being embodied,
>> situated in, and engaged with this real world.
>>
>> So, thank you for your further workings out here, and not for
>> the first time.
>>
>> -- Tim
>>
>>
>> PS: On Kierkegaard I can't respond. I've never managed to
>> think I understand what he wrote, even after repeated
>> readings, though from what you say he said, we seem to be
>> close. -:)
>>
>
> --[2]------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Date: 2026-07-31 19:35:38+00:00
> From: James Rovira <jamesrovira@gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 40.107: repetition's point
>
> I think you get him pretty well, Tim. He wrote quite a bit about memory and
> subjectivity, and he also wrote about a mind that looks forward rather than
> back.
>
> Jim R
>
> PS: On Kierkegaard I can't respond. I've never managed to
>> think I understand what he wrote, even after repeated
>> readings, though from what you say he said, we seem to be
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